Educational administration is considered as a decisive factor when it comes to manage a school or any other educative institute. But educational administration is not an isolated process because many factors converge to make it function and flow. Through the years different approaches have been applied and the results have been the result of those approaches.
As the history has proved, these results widely influence future generations and government systems too. Students learn many of their social and personal skills through educational experiences and people in charge of schools prepare and guide what type of experiences they handle.
Because of the highly competitive model of globalization that rules in the world today, students need to develop new skills such as communication, informatics and innovation, among others. As the technology is also evolving at high speed, it is also necessary to be continually updated with the new advances. All that, require qualified teachers, administrators and supervisors at the schools who can deal with changes and help the students properly.
Principals are at the top of the hierarchy of management at schools
They are considered as the most competent administrators. Traditionally, that competence was mainly associated to administrative decisions regarding structure, staff and students. Activities regarding school improvement and student learning were not fully handled by them. However, this situation has changed. Because of the complexity of the situation, principals have been forced to take control of that part of administration too.
To address this situation, it has been found that democratic principles can be applied. Those principles that have been successfully used in politic and commercial management are now applying in education too. Because of their positions, principals and school administrators have a key responsibility to set a democratic culture in schools. In order to comply with them, they must take into account opinions from everyone involved, such as parents, communities, teachers, supervisors and students. This attitude has the potential to alleviate and share the responsibility, promote positive principles such as tolerance, gender equality, respect for other´s opinions, leadership, solidarity, learn to value people and ethics, among others.
How to Manage Human Resources
The main challenge for principals and managing staff is learning how to manage human resources. Distinct to handle physical resources, humans have emotions, feelings and demands according to their nature. When the administrators acknowledge and understand their staff and the rest of people, it is easier to manage and distribute tasks.
Applying democratic principles in the administration of education has become a trend, because it is preparing students to real life situations and it allows community members to get really involved. This exchange of experiences allows students to get exposure to the reality and schools, in general, improve their quality.
In countries like Pakistan, there are some groups supporting the idea of installing democratic principles. One of them The Trust for Democratic Education and Accountability (TDEA), seeks to improve the education sector by applying those principles. This institute also supports other sectors by implementing democracy. These types of initiatives prove that democracy is expanding its influence in all areas of life. Therefore, it is very important that student begin to learn how to handle themselves in a democratic way. Schools prepare them to cope with the situations they will face at some points in their lives.